Leaks in irrigation pipes happen often in agriculture. The irrigation system can be damaged by a worker, an animal or a machine. Leaks can also be caused by wear and tear. Leaks are very labor intensive to locate (ranchers have to walk every other row in a large field). They usually go undetected until there is physical damage to a crop or to property, or when an increase in utility bills is observed by the farmer, which may be months after the leak started.
Water pumps are used to distribute the water throughout an irrigation system. Leaks in irrigation pipes change the way the water pumps run, creating a different electrical load profile. This anomalous behavior makes it more difficult to automate the irrigation system by a control system; it also makes the performance of the water pumps less predictable and prevents the effective use of energy management systems. Otherwise energy management systems could be: (1) used to leverage flexibility in the pumps that can be sold to a utility market; or (2) integrated with energy storage systems to use a renewable energy source onsite rather than conventional sources from the grid. See, for example, European patent application publication number EP20120181445 “Methods and apparatus for controlling irrigation systems”, and U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/844,605 “Digital electrical routing control system for use with electrical storage systems and conventional and alternative energy sources.”
Currently, water leaks are detected in water distribution networks using a network of hardware sensors and management software—companies such as Aclara, Itron, etc. provide such solutions to water utility companies. However, these solutions are cost prohibitive for customers beyond the utility company's water meter or for farmers who have their own water sources.
For water systems beyond the utility company's water meter, the problem has been typically identified by the appearance of water pools on the property, by pumps running dry, or by seeing significantly larger electrical bills weeks after the leak first begins. In the first two cases, the leaks are severe enough that property damage or equipment damage make the leak apparent. In the third case, the leak is either remotely located so that it wasn't previously noted, or was small enough to not yet have resulted in major damage to property or equipment. In any case, significant costs can be incurred by not quickly identifying leaks. Also, property damage and even catastrophic crop loss can occur resulting in substantial repair costs and loss of income.
There is a need for improved methods of detecting water leaks in water distribution systems generally and in particular in irrigation systems.